‘Each deity has peculiar rituals’: Sabarimala priest tells Supreme Court | India News
New Delhi: The head priest of the Sabarimala Ayyappa temple, whose custom of barring entry to menstruating women was abolished in 2018, said on Friday Supreme Court Dhananjaya Mohapatra reports that the rights and wrongs of idol worship practices, which are central to Hinduism, are judicially undetermined, while rituals are peculiar to each deity’s manifestation. Appearing for ‘Tantri’, senior advocate V Giri told a bench of Chief Justice Surya Kanth and Justices BV Nagarathna, MM Sundresh, Ahsanuddin Amanullah, Arvind Kumar, AG Masih, PB Varale, R Mahadevan and J Bagchir that a person who challenges a particular worship, ritual or practice does not object to the worship, ritual or practice of the court. Accept his petition challenging a ritual, unless it is militant against public order, morality or health. “Each Hindu deity has its own characteristics. Rituals and ceremonies followed in a temple will be either unique or at least peculiar to temples falling under the same category. Rituals are always associated with the concept of the deity,” he said. Senior advocate Rajeev Dhawan said the right of the state to enact laws and initiate reforms to eradicate social evils cannot be extended to reforms of religion, belief or belief.
